Catalyst_ A Tale of the Barque Cats - Anne McCaffrey [2]
Chessie was amazed too. This man must be serving on very low-class ships not to know the importance of Barque Cats, to have missed the story of the founding of her breed and profession. The entire crew loved to tell the story, over the com or when getting together with the crews of other ships. A ship’s Barque Cat was a great bragging point for the crew, especially since kittens from the most remarkable cats were highly prized and went to the best homes and earned the crews extra treats. Even Janina, who never preened herself, was apt to carry on at nap-inducing length about Chessie’s ancestry, breeding, history, personal qualities, and job performance. Chessie liked it that her friends boasted about her, but there were limits!
Janina had become so nervous about taking her to see Dr. Vlast—as Chessie could tell from her rapid heartbeat—it was as if she was the one who would be poked and prodded and have a thermometer shoved up her bum. Since Dr. Vlast had taken over the clinic, Janina seemed much more concerned about her health than ever before. Since the arrival of the good-looking young vet, she and Janina usually visited the clinic several times at each docking, even if she felt perfectly well. This time, the girl seemed to be welcoming the distraction of being able to talk to the curious man about her favorite subject—Barque Cats in general and her in particular. Kibble launched enthusiastically into the familiar story as they made their way through the space station to the clinic.
“Chessie’s many times great-great-grandsire, Tuxedo Thomas, originally belonged to a lady named Mrs. Montgomery, the wife of Captain Mason Montgomery,” Janina told the man. “She and Thomas lived on PS Station until she was killed in a ventilation accident. Thomas must have blamed himself for not preventing the death of his mistress, because when Captain Montgomery returned to the station, he found Thomas patrolling the ventilation ducts, apparently looking for leaks. Thomas didn’t stop the behavior when the captain, out of respect for his wife’s love of the cat, took him aboard his cargo ship, the SS Flamboyant.”
“I can see where the cat might have been a big help on cargo ships with foodstuffs,” the man conceded. “Maybe keeping down the vermin, the rodents and bugs, but surely any cat could do that—and traps and sonic deterrents and other devices would serve the same purpose.”
Hmph, Chessie thought, revising her opinion of the man downward. He must be a dog person!
“Up until then, animals were only cargo, not crew members,” Janina continued. “But Tuxedo Thomas proved himself over and over, finding tiny oxygen leaks and breaches in the hull and drawing the crew’s attention to them, as his descendants like Chessie do today. Of course, he caught vermin too, but before long he mostly acted as a self-appointed morale officer. He would visit sick crew members, sit beside others of the crew during long watches, again, all the things Chessie and her colleagues do for us today. Which is why they’re so carefully bred and expensive.”
“And your regular kind of cats don’t do those things?” the man asked. Chessie’s ruff bristled. His posture, which had initially seemed protective now felt predatory, and his light teasing tone, indicated that the story was not as new to him as he wanted Janina to believe. There was excitement in his scent too, anticipation, which was odd. It was a good story, but most people didn’t react to it that much.
Janina, focusing on her story, didn’t notice. Chessie knew that in spite of herself, her girl was thinking of Dr. Vlast. She liked him because he was a good doctor, with a way about him that made each of his patients feel as if he was their person. During the few times when Chessie had stayed at the clinic, she’d heard other cats and even dogs and horses each talking about how if anything happened to their humans, they knew they’d be okay because Dr. Vlast would take care of them. She liked him, but he affected Kibble a bit like catnip affected Chessie.